


Surviving

by winterseaspray



Category: Keys to the Kingdom
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-21
Updated: 2009-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-04 21:27:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winterseaspray/pseuds/winterseaspray
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The beginning of Drowned Wednesday from Leaf's perspective.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Surviving

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Wild Iris (Wild_Iris)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wild_Iris/gifts).



“What’s that smell?”

Leaf frowned as all the hair at the back of her neck stuck up. Cold air was blowing directly into her face, and there was a smell to it, like wet clothes left too long in a pile. “I don’t know,” she said, looking up to the vent over Arthur’s bed. “I think the air-conditioning just came on. Feel the breeze.” But her eyes were feeling too dry and there was a tight feeling across her forehead that Leaf remembered from when she had seen the dogfaces. It seemed unlikely that it was the air conditioning as the cold air began to pick up, a soft whistling sound accompanied it and the smell of salt air. “It smells kind of damp,” she added, uncertainly.

Arthur suddenly struggled into a sitting position, reaching out to grab a pair of slippers and dressing gown as he told her to get out. “That’s not the air conditioning!”

“Sure isn’t,” Leaf agreed as she watched Arthur adjusting the dressing gown over his shoulders. “Something weird is going on.” She rubbed her forehead feeling the breeze – because it had to be a breeze – pick up even more.

“Yes, it is… get out while you can!” Arthur said.

Leaf didn’t even think about it, backing up against the bed and leaning against it for support as her eyes went to the wall of their own accord. “I want to see what happens!” she said. “Hey,” she pointed to the water creeping through – or from under the joining of the wall. “There’s water coming in under the wall!”

Shallow water spread across the floor, heading in their direction and Leaf felt a slight jolt as cold water soaked her shoes. The water drained backwards, like a wave retreating on a beach, and in the pause between the next wave and the other Leaf heard the deep rumble of something incredibly loud. “I can hear something!” she said to Arthur. “Kind of like a train.”

“That’s not a train. Grab hold of the bed,” Arthur said sharply, and there was something about the way he ordered her to grab the bed that compelled her to respond. She grabbed the rail at the back of the bed and turned to look at the wall again.

It was none too soon for her to have made the grab – a wave of icy water crashed down on them, soaking her through to the skin in a moment. Clinging to the bed, Leaf tried not to panic, as her heart began to hammer in her ears. A strong current seemed to take the bed up and out of the way of the downward crash, but it was little comfort as they sped up a wave and down the other side.

She felt her grip sliding off of the rail, her fingers stiff from the cold and the shock of suddenly being in a storm on the sea. She reached out, grabbing for something on the bed, something to pull her on to the mattress firmly and prevent herself from drowning. Her hand connected with something – Arthur’s foot it seemed, and she clung on desperately, pulling herself up on to the mattress.

Her shoes were pulling her down, and she was finding it difficult to breathe with all the water. A jerk made her grip loosen, and in panic she grabbed harder, pulling herself up and on to the mattress. She managed to grab the headboard by Arthur. “What do we do now?” she screamed, because it seemed that there was no other way to communicate.

Before he could answer, they both saw the giant wave reaching upwards, and further up, blotting out the sky in its entirety. Leaf gulped, the bed moving impossibly fast up the curl in the wave, heading towards the peak where they wavered. It took Leaf a moment to realize that they were going to go over – the wrong way – and then saw Arthur was leaning into the wave, to get the bed to go down and she joined him quickly.

They sped down to the trough of the next wave and up again, this time both leaning into the wave at the same time and managing to avoid rolling. And this time there was something on the other side of the wave – a ship.

Hope flared in her for a moment – they would be saved – but it disappeared quickly as they rushed down towards the bottom of the wave – heading in a crash course direction towards hitting the ship. “It’s going to hit us! We have to jump!” She screamed.

“No! Wait!” Arthur said. Leaf thought about just jumping off, and getting away from the crash, but it was too late, they were rushing faster and faster towards the hull of the boat. Leaf closed her eyes tight and hoped that if she was going to die on a bed in the middle of nowhere the least that could be afforded to her would be a fast death.

There was a sharp jerk, and Leaf gave a yell as something tightened around her middle – was it the ship breaking her in half? And then she felt the wind and opened her eyes a little and saw the bed spiraling wildly as she and it jetted upwards. The thing that had tightened around her middle had been a rope.

Hands were suddenly grabbing her, and she was dragged, sopping wet, on the deck of the ship, coughing and sputtering as people moved around her, yelling orders and repeating them with concise surety.

Someone grabbed her roughly and she was forced to her feet. Leaf looked up and glared at whoever had grabbed her – and up, and further up. The man who was looking at her was impossibly tall, and, though not particularly handsome, he was in no way ugly. “Who are you?” he asked sharply.

“Where’s Arthur?” Leaf asked, suddenly aware that if the bed had come up – Arthur might not have made it. She dashed to the side of the ship – or attempted to.

“What is you name girl?” the man asked.

“Let go of me!” Leaf wriggled in his grip. If Arthur was stuck in the ocean by himself he couldn’t survive, not with the broken leg.

“Hurry girl!” the man yelled. Leaf was aware that everything was becoming much, much louder, like the sound of a plane flying close over head, and then she saw it – the lightning, striking the sea in a continuous barrier across the water. Eyes wide, Leaf stared as they headed straight for it. “What is your name?”

“Leaf,” Leaf replied, all thoughts struck out of her head as she stared at the line of lightning. “We’re not going into that are we?” her voice squeaked suddenly as she pointed.

“Mr. Pannikin, we have a stowaway aboard!” the man who was talking to her yelled. Another man appeared, a little taller then the other and looked down at Leaf. Leaf glared back at him.

“Well then throw her in the brig,” this second man said. The first picked her up easily as she fought against his grip and took her below. As they headed down a set of stairs, Leaf turned and could just see as they headed into the line of light.

 *

Leaf was aware she was hungry, but no one came. She lay down for a while trying to think of what she could possibly do in order to get out of this boat and head back to where Arthur was. Even if, she thought, she could get out – how was she supposed to make it back beyond that line of storms? She supposed it didn’t matter if she couldn’t get out of the chains she had been put in.

She had sat up then and started going through her pockets, hoping to find something useful in order to do something to help herself. Arthur might not be able to help her if she didn’t do things for herself.

Leaf refused to think that Arthur had died – though considering the ocean, the fact that he had no way of supporting himself out there, and the storms, it seemed almost impossible for him to have survived. The thing that sustained Leaf was the fact that she didn’t feel like he had died, in the same, tight feeling in her forehead way that she had known something was going to happen back in the hospital and with the dogfaces – fetchers. There was also the fact that Arthur was Master of the Lower House and the Far Reaches, and he must have some sort of power to enable him to survive. It would be a poor story if he died.

So she had sorted through the very damp items that had been in her pockets. Mostly it was bits of paper that she had written little notes to herself of things she had to do – now in tiny, crumbling balls on which no writing was discernable. She had a little bottle of nail polish in one pocket though, and a nail file. She almost laughed at herself for the neither of these items seemed like they would be of use all things considered. Her wallet was there with a few bills in it, and her school ID, but they didn’t seem to be useful items. All in all, it seemed like she had very little that could help her get out of this place.

Leaf wasn’t sure how long it was before she felt the boat make contact with something, and the sounds of the ocean changed a little bit, but even that change did nothing to liven her spirits. She realized soon after this though that she did have something useful – the nail file. True, she had never learned how to pick locks, but could it be very hard?

It turned out that it could. Leaf had spent quite a few hours attempting to get the chains off of her wrist when something happened. She looked up, seeing movement in the corner of her eye and changed the position of the file so as to avoid detection if it was one of the crew. Nothing seemed to happen for a long while. Leaf went back to attempting to pick the lock.

“Excuse me, miss,” a voice said – there was a squeak and Leaf looked up – and then made a sound like a frightened cat and backed up, the rattling of the chains hiding the noise. It was a rat. It wasn’t a normal rat either – about four foot tall, standing on its hind legs, and it was wearing – bizarrely – clothes. He stepped forward and lifted his hat to her. “Are you by any chance a mortal from Earth?”

Leaf stared at the rat, trying to understand how it was possible for a rat to be talking to her. She blinked – maybe it was the hunger? She realized she was shaking her head very slowly, as if trying to make the apparition vanish. The rat persisted on existing.

“Sorry,” she said finally, realizing that it wasn’t going to go away and she might as well accept it. “I just kind of… wasn’t expecting… a…” she couldn’t say ‘talking rat’ now could she? “…a visitor.”

“Allow me to introduce myself. I am Commodore Monckton, officer in charge of the Raised Rats of the Border Sea.”

None of that really made sense to Leaf. Had Arthur mentioned Raised Rats? Or the Border Sea? Was she in one of the other realms that Arthur had said existed where rats could talk? “Raised Rats? Border Sea?” Leaf asked.

“The Raised Rats, young lady, are those rats that formerly served the Piper, and were brought by him to the House. The Border Sea is a demesne of the House, notionally ruled over by Lady Wednesday, self-styled Duchess of the Boarder Sea, and Trustee of the Architect.”

Which meant nothing to Leaf, “Oh, I see,” she said, adding just a little sarcasm to her tone.

“I beg your pardon?” the Rat looked a little affronted – or maybe he didn’t understand sarcasm, Leaf thought.

“Never mind,” she said. It was nice to talk to someone, even if they were an odd rat who was wearing clothes, and she didn’t want to scare him away. “Yes, I suppose I am a mortal from Earth. A pretty dumb mortal.”

“Yet you speak,” the rat – Monckton had he called himself? – said.

“I mean dumb like stupid. Anyway, what do you want with a mortal from Earth? Can you help me get out of here?” she asked. Monckton seemed a bit stuffy – but he didn’t seem like he was going to lock her up in a cell and not even feed her.

He also didn’t seem to care about her question and pulled out a post-it sized piece of paper and held it towards her. Leaf took it from him, eyes widening as the paper expanded in her hand, before looking at a picture of Arthur. It was quite a good liking of him. There was a little block of text underneath announcing a reward for information on Arthur’s whereabouts from Suzy Turquoise Blue.

“Arthur!” Leaf cried, hope bubbling up in her. So people were looking for him, he must still be alive then – or so Leaf hoped. “And Suzy was the girl… the one with the wings.” Leaf frowned a little at the recollection of the girl appearing in her living room with Arthur.

“Ah, you know Arthur? Do you know where he is?” Monckton asked.

Leaf swallowed and looked up with slightly narrowed eyes. What did Monckton want with Arthur? Probably the reward or he wouldn’t have shown her the image. Was there a way to get free if she had information about Arthur? Could the rat help her in some way. “I might. I guess you want the reward?”

“Naturally. Though in this case we have already been paid a small retainer. We are known to be expert searchers and finders.” Leaf wasn’t sure if that was bragging, or just letting her know, and decided she didn’t care.

“I’ll tell you what I know if you help me escape,” she said holding up her hands. “And help me get to Suzy Blue.”

The rat mused for a moment. “We can’t help you escape, as that would be counter to several agreements we have with various authorities within the House. However, I would be honored to act as you counsel in the forthcoming court of inquiry into your criminal activities.”

“Criminal what?”

 *

Apparently being a denizen of the House meant you were a pompous ass who followed the letter of the law, Leaf discovered. Captain Swell had charged her with being a stowaway, and, according the books, the penalty was two hundred lashes from the cat-o’-nine-tails, which Leaf, and Monckton, were sure she wouldn’t survive. So Leaf had been forced to accept Monckton’s only offer of help, to help her get out of being lashed to death.

Monckton appeared to tell her that he had been accepted as a counsel for her, and that he needed her to tell him what exactly had happened to her. Leaf told him the story, and then tried to get information on what had happened about Arthur.

“Have you found anything on Arthur?” she asked, rather then beat about the bush, thinking Monckton would not be particularly good at understanding what she wanted to know and why.

Monckton gave her a glassy eyed look. “Those are not details you should be concerned with Miss Leaf,” he said. “And until you have more information about Lord Arthur’s presence, we would rather not share.”

“What am I going to do, get off of this boat and tell Suzy Blue myself? I can’t – you may have noticed.”

“We appreciate the help you have given us, but it is no longer a matter for your concern,” Monckton insisted.

“Arthur is my friend, and I want to know he’s okay,” Leaf replied.

“Well, we had better get you ready to go to court Miss Leaf, or you might not be able to be concerned about Lord Arthur anymore.” Leaf sighed, and settled down again to go over the details once more with Monckton.

Four days later she still didn’t have any more information from Monckton, but she didn’t have much energy to concern herself with that fact as it was the day of her trial. A young boy had appeared down by the brig and told Leaf that they were leaving soon and Swell had decided to try Leaf quickly and get rid of any evidence of her appearance as soon as possible to avoid problems with “Milady,” as he said.

The boy – who’s name was Albert, as Leaf discovered quickly – eventually came in and unlocked her from the shackles, before leading her up on to the deck. The light was much, much too bright for her, and Leaf couldn’t see for several moments as her eyes readjusted to the light painfully.

“The trial has already started, we just need your statement, and then we’ll hear the verdict,” someone said in a reedy voice. Leaf blinked and looked at the four men who were supposed to be her judges, she supposed.

Leaf did as Monckton had instructed her to, telling them all about what, exactly, had happened, without mentioning Arthur’s name. She squinted at their faces as the four men watched her. Monckton jumped in suddenly.

“You see,” he said. “Miss Leaf did not come aboard of her own free will. Miss Leaf, are you a distressed sailor?”

Leaf blinked. “No,” she said.

“Were you a passenger aboard the _Flying Mantis_?” Monckton asked.

“No,” Leaf replied.

“If she is not a stowaway, or a distressed sailor, or passenger, then who is she?” one of the men asked.

“She is not big enough to be a denizen,” another said.

“She is of the right size to be a Piper’s Child,” the third said.

“Piper’s Children are always cabin boys on the Border Sea,” the fourth said.

Monckton’s whisker’s twitched. “Is there any other thing she could be?”

Leaf stared at him, surprised. Surely if she was a cabin’s boy then she couldn’t leave the ship. She wanted to get off of this blasted boat and get away from the Border Sea, and home – or at least to find Arthur.

“No,” the denizen’s said.

“But she has not signed the articles,” one of the men said.

“She had better do that then,” Monckton said.

The tallest of the men reached into his close fitted sleeve, pulling out a sheet of paper that certainly couldn’t have fit in there and came over to Leaf, holding it out. “Here you are Miss Leaf, sign these and all charges will be dropped.”

Monckton looked at her and Leaf knew there was no way to get out of this. She signed her name.

 *

“You should have told me that I wasn’t going to get off of this boat,” Leaf complained as Monckton followed her and Albert down to get some appropriate clothes for her new life.

“Well, it was no an intentional deception,” Monckton said. “I certainly didn’t promise to get you off of this ship, but rather out of the lashing.”

“Well then, why aren’t you leaving now?” Leaf asked.

Monckton sighed. “I am about to leave, but I thought I would let you know that there has been word on your friend, Lord Arthur—“ he was about to say but Leaf jerked her head at Albert and Monckton turned it into a slight cough. “We have discovered that he is still alive.”

Leaf smiled suddenly. “Alive? Really?” Hope welled in her. Perhaps Arthur could save her, Arthur could bring her back home. She would be going home then.

“Yes,” Monckton said. He bowed slightly to Leaf then and she stopped. “A pleasure doing business with you Miss Leaf,” he said. “I hope you fare safely on this ship.”

Leaf nodded and watched the rat head back the way they had come.

“Come on Leaf,” Albert called. Leaf turned and closed her eyes for a moment, sending a thought to Arthur, and hoping he could hear it.

_You better save me._


End file.
